A Nightmare

Kunin, a young man of thirty, who was a
permanent member of the Rural Board, on returning
from Petersburg to his district, Borisovo,
immediately sent a mounted messenger to Sinkino,
for the priest there, Father Yakov Smirnov.

Five hours later Father Yakov appeared.

"Very glad to make your
acquaintance," said Kunin, meeting him in the
entry. "I've been living and serving here
for a year; it seems as though we ought to have
been acquainted before. You are very welcome!
But . . . how young you are!" Kunin added
in surprise. "What is your age?"

Kunin led his visitor into his study and began
looking at him more attentively.

"What an uncouth womanish face!" he
thought.

There certainly was a good deal that was
womanish in Father Yakov's face: the turned-up
nose, the bright red cheeks, and the large
grey-blue eyes with scanty, scarcely perceptible
eyebrows. His long reddish hair, smooth and dry,
hung down in straight tails on to his shoulders.
The hair on his upper lip was only just beginning
to form into a real masculine moustache, while his
little beard belonged to that class of
good-for-nothing beards which among divinity
students are for some reason called
"ticklers." It was scanty and extremely
transparent; it could not have been stroked or
combed, it could only have been pinched. . . .
All these scanty decorations were put on unevenly
in tufts, as though Father Yakov, thinking to
dress up as a priest and beginning to gum on the
beard, had been interrupted halfway through. He
had on a cassock, the colour of weak coffee with
chicory in it, with big patches on both elbows.

"A queer type," thought Kunin,
looking at his muddy skirts. "Comes to the
house for the first time and can't dress decently.

"Sit down, Father," he began more
carelessly than cordially, as he moved an
easy-chair to the table. "Sit down, I beg
you."

Father Yakov coughed into his fist, sank
awkwardly on to the edge of the chair, and laid
his open hands on his knees. With his short
figure, his narrow chest, his red and perspiring
face, he made from the first moment a most
unpleasant impression on Kunin. The latter could
never have imagined that there were such
undignified and pitiful-looking priests in Russia;
and in Father Yakov's attitude, in the way he held
his hands on his knees and sat on the very edge of
his chair, he saw a lack of dignity and even a
shade of servility.

"I have invited you on business, Father.
. . ." Kunin began, sinking back in his low
chair. "It has fallen to my lot to perform
the agreeable duty of helping you in one of your
useful undertakings. . . . On coming back from
Petersburg, I found on my table a letter from the
Marshal of Nobility. Yegor Dmitrevitch suggests
that I should take under my supervision the church
parish school which is being opened in Sinkino. I
shall be very glad to, Father, with all my heart.
. . . More than that, I accept the proposition
with enthusiasm."

Kunin got up and walked about the study.

"Of course, both Yegor Dmitrevitch and
probably you, too, are aware that I have not great
funds at my disposal. My estate is mortgaged, and
I live exclusively on my salary as the permanent
member. So that you cannot reckon on very much
assistance, but I will do all that is in my power.
. . . And when are you thinking of opening the
school Father?"

"When we have the money, . . ."
answered Father Yakov.

"You have some funds at your disposal
already?"

"Scarcely any. . . . The peasants
settled at their meeting that they would pay,
every man of them, thirty kopecks a year; but
that's only a promise, you know! And for the
first beginning we should need at least two
hundred roubles. . . ."

"M'yes. . . . Unhappily, I have not
that sum now," said Kunin with a sigh.
"I spent all I had on my tour and got into
debt, too. Let us try and think of some plan
together."

Kunin began planning aloud. He explained his
views and watched Father Yakov's face, seeking
signs of agreement or approval in it. But the
face was apathetic and immobile, and expressed
nothing but constrained shyness and uneasiness.
Looking at it, one might have supposed that Kunin
was talking of matters so abstruse that Father
Yakov did not understand and only listened from
good manners, and was at the same time afraid of
being detected in his failure to understand.

"The fellow is not one of the brightest,
that's evident . . ." thought Kunin.
"He's rather shy and much too stupid."

Father Yakov revived somewhat and even smiled
only when the footman came into the study bringing
in two glasses of tea on a tray and a cake-basket
full of biscuits. He took his glass and began
drinking at once.

"Shouldn't we write at once to the
bishop?" Kunin went on, meditating aloud.
"To be precise, you know, it is not we, not
the Zemstvo, but the higher ecclesiastical
authorities, who have raised the question of the
church parish schools. They ought really to
apportion the funds. I remember I read that a sum
of money had been set aside for the purpose. Do
you know nothing about it?"

Father Yakov was so absorbed in drinking tea
that he did not answer this question at once. He
lifted his grey-blue eyes to Kunin, thought a
moment, and as though recalling his question, he
shook his head in the negative. An expression of
pleasure and of the most ordinary prosaic appetite
overspread his face from ear to ear. He drank and
smacked his lips over every gulp. When he had
drunk it to the very last drop, he put his glass
on the table, then took his glass back again,
looked at the bottom of it, then put it back
again. The expression of pleasure faded from his
face. . . . Then Kunin saw his visitor take a
biscuit from the cake-basket, nibble a little bit
off it, then turn it over in his hand and
hurriedly stick it in his pocket.

"Well, that's not at all clerical!"
thought Kunin, shrugging his shoulders
contemptuously. "What is it, priestly greed
or childishness?"

After giving his visitor another glass of tea
and seeing him to the entry, Kunin lay down on the
sofa and abandoned himself to the unpleasant
feeling induced in him by the visit of Father
Yakov.

"What a strange wild creature!" he
thought. "Dirty, untidy, coarse, stupid, and
probably he drinks. . . . My God, and that's a
priest, a spiritual father! That's a teacher of
the people! I can fancy the irony there must be
in the deacon's face when before every mass he
booms out: 'Thy blessing, Reverend Father!' A fine
reverend Father! A reverend Father without a
grain of dignity or breeding, hiding biscuits in
his pocket like a schoolboy. . . . Fie! Good
Lord, where were the bishop's eyes when he
ordained a man like that? What can he think of
the people if he gives them a teacher like that?
One wants people here who . . ."

And Kunin thought what Russian priests ought
to be like.

"If I were a priest, for instance. . .
. An educated priest fond of his work might do a
great deal. . . . I should have had the school
opened long ago. And the sermons? If the priest
is sincere and is inspired by love for his work,
what wonderful rousing sermons he might
give!"

Kunin s hut his eyes and began mentally
composing a sermon. A little later he sat down to
the table and rapidly began writing.

"I'll give it to that red-haired fellow,
let him read it in church, . . ." he
thought.

The following Sunday Kunin drove over to
Sinkino in the morning to settle the question of
the school, and while he was there to make
acquaintance with the church of which he was a
parishoner. In spite of the awful state of the
roads, it was a glorious morning. The sun was
shining brightly and cleaving with its rays the
layers of white snow still lingering here and
there. The snow as it took leave of the earth
glittered with such diamonds that it hurt the eyes
to look, while the young winter corn was hastily
thrusting up its green beside it. The rooks
floated with dignity over the fields. A rook
would fly, drop to earth, and give several hops
before standing firmly on its feet. . . .

The wooden church up to which Kunin drove was
old and grey; the columns of the porch had once
been painted white, but the colour had now
completely peeled off, and they looked like two
ungainly shafts. The ikon over the door looked
like a dark smudged blur. But its poverty touched
and softened Kunin. Modestly dropping his eyes,
he went into the church and stood by the door.
The service had only just begun. An old
sacristan, bent into a bow, was reading the
"Hours" in a hollow indistinct tenor.
Father Yakov, who conducted the service without a
deacon, was walking about the church, burning
incense. Had it not been for the softened mood in
which Kunin found himself on entering the
poverty-stricken church, he certainly would have
smiled at the sight of Father Yakov. The short
priest was wearing a crumpled and extremely long
robe of some shabby yellow material; the hem of
the robe trailed on the ground.

The church was not full. Looking at the
parishoners, Kunin was struck at the first glance
by one strange circumstance: he saw nothing but
old people and children. . . . Where were the
men of working age? Where was the youth and
manhood? But after he had stood there a little
and looked more attentively at the aged-looking
faces, Kunin saw that he had mistaken young people
for old. He did not, however, attach any
significance to this little optical illusion.

The church was as cold and grey inside as
outside. There was not one spot on the ikons nor
on the dark brown walls which was not begrimed and
defaced by time. There were many windows, but the
general effect of colour was grey, and so it was
twilight in the church.

"Anyone pure in soul can pray here very
well," thought Kunin. "Just as in St.
Peter's in Rome one is impressed by grandeur, here
one is touched by the lowliness and
simplicity."

But his devout mood vanished like smoke as
soon as Father Yakov went up to the altar and
began mass. Being still young and having come
straight from the seminary bench to the
priesthood, Father Yakov had not yet formed a set
manner of celebrating the service. As he read he
seemed to be vacillating between a high tenor and
a thin bass; he bowed clumsily, walked quickly,
and opened and shut the gates abruptly. . . .
The old sacristan, evidently deaf and ailing, did
not hear the prayers very distinctly, and this
very often led to slight misunderstandings.
Before Father Yakov had time to finish what he had
to say, the sacristan began chanting his response,
or else long after Father Yakov had finished the
old man would be straining his ears, listening in
the direction of the altar and saying nothing till
his skirt was pulled. The old man had a sickly
hollow voice and an asthmatic quavering lisp. .
. . The complete lack of dignity and decorum was
emphasized by a very small boy who seconded the
sacristan and whose head was hardly visible over
the railing of the choir. The boy sang in a
shrill falsetto and seemed to be trying to avoid
singing in tune. Kunin stayed a little while,
listened and went out for a smoke. He was
disappointed, and looked at the grey church almost
with dislike.

"They complain of the decline of
religious feeling among the people. . ." he
sighed. "I should rather think so! They'd
better foist a few more priests like this one on
them!"

Kunin went back into the church three times,
and each time he felt a great temptation to get
out into the open air again. Waiting till the end
of the mass, he went to Father Yakov's. The
priest's house did not differ outwardly from the
peasants' huts, but the thatch lay more smoothly
on the roof and there were little white curtains
in the windows. Father Yakov led Kunin into a
light little room with a clay floor and walls
covered with cheap paper; in spite of some painful
efforts towards luxury in the way of photographs
in frames and a clock with a pair of scissors
hanging on the weight the furnishing of the room
impressed him by its scantiness. Looking at the
furniture, one might have supposed that Father
Yakov had gone from house to house and collected
it in bits; in one place they had given him a
round three-legged table, in another a stool, in a
third a chair with a back bent violently
backwards; in a fourth a chair with an upright
back, but the seat smashed in; while in a fifth
they had been liberal and given him a semblance of
a sofa with a flat back and a lattice-work seat.
This semblance had been painted dark red and smelt
strongly of paint. Kunin meant at first to sit
down on one of the chairs, but on second thoughts
he sat down on the stool.

"This is the first time you have been to
our church?" asked Father Yakov, hanging his
hat on a huge misshapen nail.

"Yes it is. I tell you what, Father,
before we begin on business, will you give me some
tea? My soul is parched."

Father Yakov blinked, gasped, and went behind
the partition wall. There was a sound of
whispering.

"With his wife, I suppose," thought
Kunin; "it would be interesting to see what
the red-headed fellow's wife is like."

A little later Father Yakov came back, red and
perspiring and with an effort to smile, sat down
on the edge of the sofa.

"They will heat the samovar
directly," he said, without looking at his
visitor.

"My goodness, they have not heated the
samovar yet!" Kunin thought with horror.
"A nice time we shall have to wait."

"I have brought you," he said,
"the rough draft of the letter I have written
to the bishop. I'll read it after tea; perhaps
you may find something to add. . . ."

"Very well."

A silence followed. Father Yakov threw
furtive glances at the partition wall, smoothed
his hair, and blew his nose.

"It's wonderful weather, . . ." he
said.

"Yes. I read an interesting thing
yesterday. . . . the Volsky Zemstvo have
decided to give their schools to the clergy,
that's typical."

Kunin got up, and pacing up and down the clay
floor, began to give expression to his
reflections.

"That would be all right," he said,
"if only the clergy were equal to their high
calling and recognized their tasks. I am so
unfortunate as to know priests whose standard of
culture and whose moral qualities make them hardly
fit to be army secretaries, much less priests.
You will agree that a bad teacher does far less
harm than a bad priest."

Kunin glanced at Father Yakov; he was sitting
bent up, thinking intently about something and
apparently not listening to his visitor.

"Yasha, come here!" a woman's voice
called from behind the partition. Father Yakov
started and went out. Again a whispering began.

Kunin felt a pang of longing for tea.

"No; it's no use my waiting for tea
here," he thought, looking at his watch.
"Besides I fancy I am not altogether a
welcome visitor. My host has not deigned to say
one word to me; he simply sits and blinks."

Kunin took up his hat, waited for Father Yakov
to return, and said good-bye to him.

"I have simply wasted the morning,"
he thought wrathfully on the way home. "The
blockhead! The dummy! He cares no more about the
school than I about last year's snow. . . .
No, I shall never get anything done with him! We
are bound to fail! If the Marshal knew what the
priest here was like, he wouldn't be in such a
hurry to talk about a school. We ought first to
try and get a decent priest, and then think about
the school."

By now Kunin almost hated Father Yakov. The
man, his pitiful, grotesque figure in the long
crumpled robe, his womanish face, his manner of
officiating, his way of life and his formal
restrained respectfulness, wounded the tiny relic
of religious feeling which was stored away in a
warm corner of Kunin's heart together with his
nurse's other fairy tales. The coldness and lack
of attention with which Father Yakov had met
Kunin's warm and sincere interest in what was the
priest's own work was hard for the former's vanity
to endure. . . .

On the evening of the same day Kunin spent a
long time walking about his rooms and thinking.
Then he sat down to the table resolutely and wrote
a letter to the bishop. After asking for money
and a blessing for the school, he set forth
genuinely, like a son, his opinion of the priest
at Sinkino.

"He is young," he wrote,
"insufficiently educated, leads, I fancy, an
intemperate life, and altogether fails to satisfy
the ideals which the Russian people have in the
course of centuries formed of what a pastor should
be."

After writing this letter Kunin heaved a deep
sigh, and went to bed with the consciousness that
he had done a good deed.

On Monday morning, while he was still in bed,
he was informed that Father Yakov had arrived. He
did not want to get up, and instructed the servant
to say he was not at home. On Tuesday he went
away to a sitting of the Board, and when he
returned on Saturday he was told by the servants
that Father Yakov had called every day in his
absence.

"He liked my biscuits, it seems," he
thought.

Towards evening on Sunday Father Yakov
arrived. This time not only his skirts, but even
his hat, was bespattered with mud. Just as on his
first visit, he was hot and perspiring, and sat
down on the edge of his chair as he had done then.
Kunin determined not to talk about the
school--not to cast pearls.

"I have brought you a list of books for
the school, Pavel Mihailovitch, . . ."
Father Yakov began.

"Thank you."

But everything showed that Father Yakov had
come for something else besides the list. Has
whole figure was expressive of extreme
embarrassment, and at the same time there was a
look of determination upon his face, as on the
face of a man suddenly inspired by an idea. He
struggled to say something important, absolutely
necessary, and strove to overcome his timidity.

"Why is he dumb?" Kunin thought
wrathfully. "He's settled himself
comfortably! I haven't time to be bothered with
him."

To smoothe over the awkwardness of his silence
and to conceal the struggle going on within him,
the priest began to smile constrainedly, and this
slow smile, wrung out on his red perspiring face,
and out of keeping with the fixed look in his
grey-blue eyes, made Kunin turn away. He felt
moved to repulsion.

"Excuse me, Father, I have to go
out," he said.

Father Yakov started like a man asleep who has
been struck a blow, and, still smiling, began in
his confusion wrapping round him the skirts of his
cassock. In spite of his repulsion for the man,
Kunin felt suddenly sorry for him, and he wanted
to soften his cruelty.

"Please come another time, Father,"
he said, "and before we part I want to ask
you a favour. I was somehow inspired to write two
sermons the other day. . . . I will give them
to you to look at. If they are suitable, use
them."

"Very good," said Father Yakov,
laying his open hand on Kunin's sermons which were
lying on the table. "I will take them."

After standing a little, hesitating and still
wrapping his cassock round him, he suddenly gave
up the effort to smile and lifted his head
resolutely.

"I have heard that you . . . er . .
. have dismissed your secretary, and . . . and
are looking for a new one. . . ."

"Yes, I am. . . . Why, have you
someone to recommend?"

"I. . . er . . . you see . . . I
. . . Could you not give the post to me?"

"Why, are you giving up the Church?"
said Kunin in amazement.

"No, no," Father Yakov brought out
quickly, for some reason turning pale and
trembling all over. "God forbid! If you
feel doubtful, then never mind, never mind. You
see, I could do the work between whiles,. . so
as to increase my income. . . . Never mind,
don't disturb yourself!"

"Good heavens! I would take ten,"
whispered Father Yakov, looking about him.
"Ten would be enough! You . . . you are
astonished, and everyone is astonished. The
greedy priest, the grasping priest, what does he
do with his money? I feel myself I am greedy, .
. . and I blame myself, I condemn myself. . .
. I am ashamed to look people in the face. . .
. I tell you on my conscience, Pavel Mihailovitch.
. . . I call the God of truth to witness. . .
. "

Father Yakov took breath and went on:

"On the way here I prepared a regular
confession to make you, but . . . I've
forgotten it all; I cannot find a word now. I get
a hundred and fifty roubles a year from my parish,
and everyone wonders what I do with the money. .
. . But I'll explain it all truly. . . . I
pay forty roubles a year to the clerical school
for my brother Pyotr. He has everything found
there, except that I have to provide pens and
paper."

"Oh, I believe you; I believe you! But
what's the object of all this?" said Kunin,
with a wave of the hand, feeling terribly
oppressed by this outburst of confidence on the
part of his visitor, and not knowing how to get
away from the tearful gleam in his eyes.

"Then I have not yet paid up all that I
owe to the consistory for my place here. They
charged me two hundred roubles for the living, and
I was to pay ten roubles a month. . . . You
can judge what is left! And, besides, I must
allow Father Avraamy at least three roubles a
month."

"What Father Avraamy?"

"Father Avraamy who was priest at Sinkino
before I came. He was deprived of the living on
account of . . . his failing, but you know, he
is still living at Sinkino! He has nowhere to go.
There is no one to keep him. Though he is old, he
must have a corner, and food and clothing--I
can't let him go begging on the roads in his
position! It would be on my conscience if
anything happened! It would be my fault! He is.
. . in debt all round; but, you see, I am to
blame for not paying for him."

Father Yakov started up from his seat and,
looking frantically at the floor, strode up and
down the room.

"My God, my God!" he muttered,
raising his hands and dropping them again.
"Lord, save us and have mercy upon us! Why
did you take such a calling on yourself if you
have so little faith and no strength? There is no
end to my despair! Save me, Queen of
Heaven!"

"Calm yourself, Father," said Kunin.

"I am worn out with hunger, Pavel
Mihailovitch," Father Yakov went on.
"Generously forgive me, but I am at the end
of my strength. . . . I know if I were to beg
and to bow down, everyone would help, but . . .
I cannot! I am ashamed. How can I beg of the
peasants? You are on the Board here, so you know.
. . . How can one beg of a beggar? And to beg of
richer people, of landowners, I
cannot! I have pride! I am ashamed!"

Father Yakov waved his hand, and nervously
scratched his head with both hands.

"I am ashamed! My God, I am ashamed! I
am proud and can't bear people to see my poverty!
When you visited me, Pavel Mihailovitch, I had no
tea in the house! There wasn't a pinch of it, and
you know it was pride prevented me from telling
you! I am ashamed of my clothes, of these patches
here. . . . I am ashamed of my vestments, of
being hungry. . . . And is it seemly for a
priest to be proud?"

Father Yakov stood still in the middle of the
study, and, as though he did not notice Kunin's
presence, began reasoning with himself.

"Well, supposing I endure hunger and
disgrace--but, my God, I have a wife! I took
her from a good home! She is not used to hard
work; she is soft; she is used to tea and white
bread and sheets on her bed. . . . At home she
used to play the piano. . . . She is young,
not twenty yet. . . . She would like, to be
sure, to be smart, to have fun, go out to see
people. . . . And she is worse off with me
than any cook; she is ashamed to show herself in
the street. My God, my God! Her only treat is
when I bring an apple or some biscuit from a
visit. . . ."

Father Yakov scratched his head again with
both hands.

"And it makes us feel not love but pity
for each other. . . . I cannot look at her
without compassion! And the things that happen in
this life, O Lord! Such things that people would
not believe them if they saw them in the
newspaper. . .
. And when will there be an end to it all!"

"Hush, Father!" Kunin almost
shouted, frightened at his tone. "Why take
such a gloomy view of life?"

"Generously forgive me, Pavel
Mihailovitch . . ." muttered Father Yakov
as though he were drunk, "Forgive me, all
this . . . doesn't matter, and don't take any
notice of it. . . . Only I do blame myself,
and always shall blame myself .
. . always."

Father Yakov looked about him and began
whispering:

"One morning early I was going from
Sinkino to Lutchkovo; I saw a woman standing on
the river bank, doing something. . . . I went
up close and could not believe my eyes. . . .
It was horrible! The wife of the doctor, Ivan
Sergeitch, was sitting there washing her linen. .
. . A doctor's wife, brought up at a select
boarding-school! She had got up you see, early
and gone half a mile from the village that people
should not see her. . . . She couldn't get
over her pride! When she saw that I was near her
and noticed her poverty, she turned red all over.
. . . I was flustered--I was frightened, and
ran up to help her, but she hid her linen from me;
she was afraid I should see her ragged chemises.
. . ."

"All this is positively incredible,"
said Kunin, sitting down and looking almost with
horror at Father Yakov's pale face.

"Incredible it is! It's a thing that has
never been! Pavel Mihailovitch, that a doctor's
wife should be rinsing the linen in the river!
Such a thing does not happen in any country! As
her pastor and spiritual father, I ought not to
allow it, but what can I do? What? Why, I am
always trying to get treated by her husband for
nothing myself! It is true that, as you say, it
is all incredible! One can hardly believe one's
eyes. During Mass, you know, when I look out from
the altar and see my congregation, Avraamy
starving, and my wife, and think of the doctor's
wife--how blue her hands were from the cold
water--would you believe it, I forget myself and
stand senseless like a fool, until the sacristan
calls to me. . . . It's awful!"

Father Yakov began walking about again.

"Lord Jesus!" he said, waving his
hands, "holy Saints! I can't officiate
properly. . . . Here you talk to me about the
school, and I sit like a dummy and don't
understand a word, and think of nothing but food.
. . . Even before the altar. . . . But . .
. what am I doing?" Father Yakov pulled
himself up suddenly. "You want to go out.
Forgive me, I meant nothing. . . . Excuse . .
."

Kunin shook hands with Father Yakov without
speaking, saw him into the hall, and going back
into his study, stood at the window. He saw
Father Yakov go out of the house, pull his
wide-brimmed rusty-looking hat over his eyes, and
slowly, bowing his head, as though ashamed of his
outburst, walk along the road.

"I don't see his horse," thought
Kunin.

Kunin did not dare to think that the priest
had come on foot every day to see him; it was five
or six miles to Sinkino, and the mud on the road
was impassable. Further on he saw the coachman
Andrey and the boy Paramon, jumping over the
puddles and splashing Father Yakov with mud, run
up to him for his blessing. Father Yakov took off
his hat and slowly blessed Andrey, then blessed
the boy and stroked his head.

Kunin passed his hand over his eyes, and it
seemed to him that his hand was moist. He walked
away from the window and with dim eyes looked
round the room in which he still seemed to hear
the timid droning voice. He glanced at the table.
Luckily, Father Yakov, in his haste, had forgotten
to take the sermons. Kunin rushed up to them,
tore them into pieces, and with loathing thrust
them under the table.

"And I did not know!" he moaned,
sinking on to the sofa. "After being here
over a year as member of the Rural Board, Honorary
Justice of the Peace, member of the School
Committee! Blind puppet, egregious idiot! I must
make haste and help them, I must make haste!"

He turned from side to side uneasily, pressed
his temples and racked his brains.

"On the twentieth I shall get my salary,
two hundred roubles. . . . On some good
pretext I will give him some, and some to the
doctor's wife. . . . I will ask them to
perform a special service here, and will get up an
illness for the doctor. . . . In that way I
shan't wound their pride. And I'll help Father
Avraamy too. . . ."

He reckoned his money on his fingers, and was
afraid to own to himself that those two hundred
roubles would hardly be enough for him to pay his
steward, his servants, the peasant who brought the
meat. . . . He could not help remembering the
recent past when he was senselessly squandering
his father's fortune, when as a puppy of twenty he
had given expensive fans to prostitutes, had paid
ten roubles a day to Kuzma, his cab-driver, and in
his vanity had made presents to actresses. Oh,
how useful those wasted rouble, three-rouble,
ten-rouble notes would have been now!

"Father Avraamy lives on three roubles a
month!" thought Kunin. "For a rouble
the priest's wife could get herself a chemise, and
the doctor's wife could hire a washerwoman. But
I'll help them, anyway! I must help them."

Here Kunin suddenly recalled the private
information he had sent to the bishop, and he
writhed as from a sudden draught of cold air.
This remembrance filled him with overwhelming
shame before his inner self and before the unseen
truth.

So had begun and had ended a sincere effort to
be of public service on the part of a
well-intentioned but unreflecting and
over-comfortable person.